


Cry Over You (I'm Not Gonna)

by Frayach



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Best Friends, Episode: s01e01 Pilot, First Love, First Time, Gap Filler, Heartbreak, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-15
Updated: 2013-01-15
Packaged: 2017-11-25 15:33:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/640360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Frayach/pseuds/Frayach
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everybody cries over someone who broke their heart - even if it only happens once.  This story is set between the end of the pilot episode through Season One, Episode Three.  Sometimes a fuck isn't just a fuck, no matter what we tell ourselves.</p><p> </p><p>  <img/></p>
            </blockquote>





	Cry Over You (I'm Not Gonna)

George Goodfuck may’ve been as good as his name, but Brian would never know. After watching the kid . . . no, not “the kid,” Justin . . . drive away, he wasn’t in the mood anymore. They’d shared a couple of beers though, which was weird. He never just hung out with tricks – especially tricks he’d picked up on the internet. But then again G.G. wasn’t really a trick. They hadn’t fucked. Brian didn’t want him to spend the night or anything crazy like that, but he also didn’t feel the need to boot his ass out the door the second the condom came off.

“Cute kid,” G.G. said. “But you’re not the brightest bulb in the box, are you?” 

Brian put down his bottle and gaped at him. Maybe he’d been wrong about not kicking G.G. out the second he’d gotten back.

“Excuse me?”

G.G. took a moment to casually sip his beer before answering. “Listen, I’m not blaming you. Who doesn’t want it? It’s every fag’s wet dream. I’m not sure I could’ve passed up the opportunity if it’d been me. He’s adorable.”

 _Adorable?_ Brian looked at him. G.G. didn’t seem like an asshole. Maybe not James Dean in the looks department, but not a vacuous all-brawn-and-no-brains boy toy like Brian’s usual tricks. He decided to take the bait. “What’re you talking about?”

The dismissal implicit in G.G.’s eye roll was nullified by his smile. “A schoolboy,” he said. “A virgin. How old is he, anyway? Fifteen?”

Brian grimaced. “Jesus, no. Seventeen.” 

“At least that’s what he told you. Looked fifteen to me, and if you tell me that’s not one of the reasons you brought him home, I’ll leave here thinking you’re a liar as well as an asshole.”

Brian laughed. He kind of liked the guy. “‘Nother beer?” G.G. shrugged and Brian went to the fridge.

“Anything other than Sam?”

“Beam.”

G.G. seemed to consider his options for a moment. “I’ll stick with beer,” he said. “Work tomorrow.”

Brian fought the urge to ask what he did. Face and hands like G.G.’s suggested a blue collar job. Maybe he knew Jack. Brian almost laughed out loud, but caught himself at the last second.

“Carpenter,” G.G. said. “Cabinets.” He must’ve seen something in Brian’s expression that invited the confidence. Not for the first time, Brian cursed his inability to maintain a poker face.

“So,” he said, turning back to less personal topics, “I brought the kid home to pop his cherry?”

“Didn’t you?” G.G. said, accepting the bottle Brian held out to him.

Brian leaned against the counter and regarded the floor long enough for the silence to become awkward. “Maybe,” he said. He looked up. G.G.’s eyebrow was raised. “Yeah,” he added.

G.G. laughed good naturedly. “So did you?”

Brian chewed on his lip to suppress what he feared might be a triumphant grin. “Yeah,” he said. “But that’s all I’m saying about it.”

G.G. made a gesture of gracious acceptance. “You have better manners than I’d thought at first,” he said. “Although you’re hardly a gentleman.”

Brian huffed. “My reputation precedes me, I see.”

“It does, indeed,” G.G. said with a chuckle. “So tell me the truth, and Scout’s honor I won’t repeat it . . .”

“Scout’s honor?” Brian said with a snort. “Don’t try to tell me you were in the Boy Scouts.”

“Eagle Scout, in fact,” G.G. replied. “And ROTC in college. I thought all us queers did Boy Scouts . . .”

“Did, perhaps.” Brian’s accompanying smile was heavy with implication. “So, did you earn the Best Bottom Badge?”

“First badge, in fact,” G.G. replied. “I was thirteen. How old were you?”

“Fourteen.” Christ, he hardly ever thought about Mr. Culpepper, yet here he was talking about the bastard for the second time in twenty-four hours.

“Cry over him?” G.G. asked, setting down his bottle and holding Brian’s eyes with his.

Brian gave him his best “you’ve got to be fucking kidding me” expression. “Yeah. Right,” he lied through his teeth. “I’ve never cried over anyone.”

“Bullshit,” G.G. replied. “We all do – at least once.”

Brian fixed him with a disbelieving gaze. This guy cried? A fucking former-ROTC carpenter wearing a biker vest with arms as hairy as a gorilla’s? Emmett, he could imagine. And definitely Ted. But George Goodfuck?

“Who was he?” G.G. ignored Brian’s obvious skepticism.

They engaged for a minute in an eye-wrestling contest. The stakes were too high for Brian to lose. He tried to make his expression as hard and cold as possible, although he suspected he only managed haughty. Nonetheless, it was G.G. who broke first.

“Mine was my troop leader,” he said. 

“How unimaginative.”

G.G. shrugged. “It was on an overnight. He invited me to his tent after all the other kids were asleep, told me to be really quiet. It was hard though. Fucking hurt. But he was alright. Even kissed me. It happened a couple more times, and then . . .” G.G. paused and took a swig of beer. “ . . . then I guess he lost interest. There were always new kids joining the troop. Fresh pickings. Told me he’d ‘had me.’ ‘Magine saying that to a kid.”

Brian winced and threw back the last of his beer. As he always did when he felt like he’d been caught with his hand in the cookie jar, he began pacing with long determined strides. The soles of his feet were gritty from running after the kid . . . Justin. He had to stop thinking of him as the kid because . . . well, because it made him remember that Mr. Culpepper had called him the same thing. _Hey, kid,_ he’d said when he’d found Brian loitering near his car. _Buzz off._

Brian stopped mid-stride. 

“Gym teacher,” he said. “Freshman year. Blew him in the shower once and in his car a couple of times. Once in the equipment closet. He never fucked me though.”

Brian didn’t add how he’d begged him to.

G.G. nodded in solidarity. “Can’t decide if I’m angry,” he said. “It wasn’t liked he raped me, except maybe statutorily, but statutory rape is bullshit. I wanted it.” He paused and drained the rest of his beer before setting it down in a gesture of finality. “What I _didn’t_ want was a broken heart. It’s never really gone away, I guess. Which is why I don’t fuck teenagers. And it’s why you shouldn’t have either.”

Brian had been standing with his back to him. “Chat’s over,” he said. He didn’t turn around.

“I figured,” G.G. replied. “Thanks for the beer.”

Brian listened to his footsteps and then the steel-mill clang and crash of his door. He must’ve taken the stairs because Brian didn’t hear the elevator. After a moment of staring at the wall, he walked to the kitchen and put his bottle in the sink. 

The kid . . . _Justin, Goddamit!_ . . . had cried, and Brian _knew_ it was as much from humiliation as heartbreak. That’s how _he’d_ felt. It’d been like Jack. Not the slaps, but the look of derision as if to say “Come on, Sonny-boy, after all these years, did you honestly believe I’d take you to the ball game? Expectations are for losers. Get over it.”

Brian sighed and went to stand in front of the window. The sky was clear; there were no clouds to trap the orange haze of the city’s lights. The buildings were black, their outlines all but invisible. It made it look as though their lit windows hovered in the air, unmoored, floating like square balloons. 

Fuck.

He’d never made anyone cry before. At least not that he knew of. Pulling Claire’s hair and twisting the heads off her Barbies didn’t count. He hadn’t been a _complete_ asshole, though. He could’ve laughed in the kid’s face – and maybe he should’ve. If he had, maybe the kid would hate him. It’s easier to forget someone you hate . . .

God, he _wished_ he could’ve hated Mr. Culpepper. Instead the bastard had said he “just needed some space.” _Just needed space?_ What the fuck? It hadn’t been as though Brian was showing up at the Culpepper residence and throwing rocks at the bedroom window . . .

. . . but there had been that teddy bear.

Jesus. Brian rested his forehead against his window as the shame washed over him as stingingly-fresh as though he was fourteen again. The bear had had a baseball cap and a little whistle around its neck. It’d a cost him two-month’s allowance. He’d snuck into Mr. Culpepper’s office and left it on his chair.

Brian straightened and walked purposefully toward the kitchen where he pulled a glass from the cabinet and half-filled it with whiskey. He didn’t bother with ice, instead throwing it back and pouring another. The ghost of mortification burned even more than the liquor.

“You can’t do things like that,” Mr. Culpepper had said – not quite angry but definitely exasperated as though he’d been through the same thing before. “I’m your gym teacher, not your boyfriend.” He’d handed the bear back to Brian and turned away. “I’m busy,” he’d said when Brian didn’t leave, but Brian hadn’t been able to. His sneakers felt glued to the floor. When Mr. Culpepper turned with a weary, irritated sigh that was when it happened. The painful lump, the welling eyes, the snots. 

Mr. Culpepper’s expression had softened slightly. “Hey,” he’d said almost kindly. “Someday you’ll look back on this and realize I did you a favor. Now go get your bus.”

Brian winced as he remembered what’d happened next – both at the memory of his humiliated teenaged self and at the memory of the kid’s . . . oh my fucking _God_ , what was wrong with him? . . . _Justin_ . . . at the memory of Justin’s tears. He knew from experience how much it must’ve cost him to know that Brian saw them.

He’d thrown the bear in the dumpster behind Pete’s Tavern and pulled the brim of his Pirates cap as far down as he could. When he got home, he’d run up the stairs to his room and slammed the door shut. And then he’d cried into his pillow. Cried and cried and cried.

Brian sighed and closed his eyes. Where was Justin now? Brian didn’t know anything about him, but he was willing to bet Justin hadn’t gone home. Maybe he had a friend – his version of a Mikey. Brian found himself hoping that he did. The thought of the kid parked somewhere with his head on the steering wheel crying as hard and as long as Brian had that long-ago afternoon was painful enough to portend a sleepless night. He thought about the Xanax in his little treasure chest, but somehow it didn’t seem right. If Justin was going to spend a sleepless night, then Brian was too. He’d marinated in Catholic guilt long enough to not wish for a hairshirt. Some pathetic kind of absolution. 

He wondered if Mr. Culpepper had ever felt the same way.

* * * *

Just because it was early September didn’t mean it wasn’t chilly at four o’clock in the morning. Justin lifted his head off the steering wheel and looked longingly through swollen eyes at the lights of an all-night CVS. Maybe he could buy a Coke and use it like an icepack to reduce the puffiness around his eyes. At the very least he could buy some Kleenix; his sleeves were damp with snot. Fuck. Even his eyelashes felt glued together. But if he went in the CVS, people would see him and know he’d been crying. A seventeen year-old crying like a stupid little baby.

God, he’d made the biggest fool of himself! What the hell had he been thinking? But that was just it; he hadn’t been. All he’d known was that he _had_ to see Brian again – that he _had_ to talk with him. Although what he would’ve said, he didn’t know. Because it was a joke, wasn’t it? That someone like Brian could be a boyfriend? What had he expected – that they’d go to a movie together, sharing a tub of popcorn and salt and butter kisses? That’s what the kids at school did – that and make-out in their cars behind the Big Q. How could he really have thought that an almost-thirty year-old man, with a newborn for fuck sake, would want to go to MacDonald’s and lie on the bed in Justin’s room, holding hands and listening to the stereo? God, how could he have been so _stupid_?

But they’d _made love_. He knew they had just as he knew the sun would eventually come up and erase this, the worst night of his whole life. Brian had kissed him softly, not like the way they’d kissed earlier before Justin had told him he was seventeen and admitted it was his first time. He’d only ever kissed someone once before – a girl from another school with braces and big boobs. He hadn’t seen what all the fuss was about, but _now_ he did. God, did he _ever_! Brian’s tongue had been warm and slippery, and kissing him had felt like the best thing on earth. They could’ve done nothing else, and Justin would’ve been happy. More than happy. But they hadn’t stopped there. Brian had pinched and sucked and basically chewed on his nipples. Justin hadn’t even known that was something guys did to each other – it seemed so girly – but then he’d almost come, just from that alone. When Brian had stopped and looked up at him, he’d had a grin that said, “I know how I just made you feel” as though he knew Justin’s body better than Justin did. He was right.

How can you do that with someone if you don’t feel something for them? It was so . . . intimate. Not to mention what Brian had done _after_ that. It’d been absolutely amazing – Brian had made it seem like it wasn’t gross. He’d been mortified at first and spent a couple minutes frantically trying to recall when he’d last taken a dump, but then he’d stopped thinking about anything except the way Brian’s mouth and fingers were making him feel. Of course, Justin wasn’t naïve enough not to know about anal sex – he’d even fantasied about it and wondered how it might feel – but never in a million years had he imagined . . . what was it called again? Rimming? By the time Brian had finished, Justin had felt wide open and _ready_ for whatever Brian was going to do next, but he hadn’t felt embarrassed. Brian had seemed liked he loved it just as much as Justin had. He’d even jerked off afterward. Justin had watched over his shoulder. Brian did it slower than Justin did, almost lazily, until right at the end. He came on Justin’s back, and then blew Justin’s mind again by licking it up. Justin had tasted his own come once, and it was disgusting, but it hadn’t seemed that way to Brian who’d closed his eyes and seemed to savor every drop. And then Brian had kissed him, and Justin had realized that “disgusting” was no longer a word he’d ever again associate with anything having to do with sex. It’d been just one of the many revelations he’d experienced last night . . . that Brian had revealed to him.

Justin’s dick started hardening from the memory, but that only got him crying again. Who else was ever going to make him feel like that again? Who else would he ever let do to him what Brian had done?

Was that what Brian had done with that old hairy guy – what was his name? George? . . . Was that what he was even still doing? Justin shuddered as much from pain as revulsion. _Justin, I’ve had you_ , Brian had said as though Justin was a movie he’d already watched or a book he’d already read and didn’t find good enough to read again. What had he done wrong? Had he come too soon? Was his ass weird or something? Had he sucked? Had he been too much of a baby when Brian first entered him? Was he ugly? Was he stupid? Was he not enough?

The tears just wouldn’t fucking stop. He was going to have to skip school. There was _no way_ he could show up looking like this. That’d be just what he needed – people laughing at him. At least Daphne wouldn’t, but all the same he cringed as he recalled telling her how Brian had said he loved him. Why had he told her that? Perhaps it was because it was what he wanted to believe – maybe even what he _needed_ to believe.

He punched the steering wheel with the heel of his palm, furious at himself and feeling even more stupid knowing that it was Brian he should be furious with. But he couldn’t be. Not after what they’d done. Not after the way Brian had moved inside him. It’d been just like when he’d jerked off – slow at first and then faster, harder, _deeper_. He’d risen to his knees at one point, yanking Justin’s ass up on his thighs, and reached for Justin’s hand.

“Make yourself come,” he’d said, his voice rough. He’d reached for the KY and squirted a dollop onto Justin’s palm. “You won’t come like this – especially not your first time.” He’d taken Justin’s hand and closed his fingers around his dick. At first Justin had been shy about jerking off in front of someone else, but then when he’d started, he couldn’t stop. The combination of Brian’s dick in his ass and the slick stroking of his hand was amazing. He’d stared up at Brian’s face and watched Brian’s eyes roll back as he began thrusting more purposefully. Justin had come quicker than he’d wanted to, and Brian had grinned, wolfishly pleased with himself, but he hadn’t made Justin feel stupid like he had earlier; instead it seemed to push him over his own edge and he’d grimaced in what looked more like pain than pleasure as he’d rocked his hips between Justin’s legs. _Fuck_ , he’d moaned and then pulled out, surprising Justin with the realization that pulling out hurt almost as much as putting it in. Brian had pulled off the condom and tossed it on the floor. “So, what did you think?” he’d asked breathlessly.

All Justin did was grin for a moment before he could pull his wits together enough to answer. “Amazing,” he’d said. “Fucking _amazing_.”

Jesus, he’d almost said it then. _I love you_ had been on the tip of his tongue. Thank fuck, he hadn’t. After the way Brian had been tonight, he’d probably have laughed in his face. At least all he’d said is “I want you.”

You can’t have me.

Justin punched the steering wheel again. When was the last time someone had told him he couldn’t have something? He couldn't remember. Certainly not his parents. Certainly not Daphne. “You can’t have” was simply not a part of his lexicon. For the first time since he’d left Brian standing barefoot and beautiful on the sidewalk, Justin smiled. It was wobbly, but it was still a smile nonetheless.

We’ll just have to see about that, won’t we, Mr. Kinney? Brian was clearly a force of nature, but Justin was a bona fide gold-plated Gen Y brat. Never get between an entitled Gen Y’er and his object of desire. It was like standing between a lion and a wounded gazelle. In other words: Not a good idea.

* * * *

Brian was used to waking up feeling not particularly good about himself, but this morning was even worse than usual. He shut off the alarm and rolled onto his back, trying to recall the night before. Woody’s. www.teninches.com. Poppers . . . oh fuck.

He scrubbed his face and ran his fingers through his hair. The kid. He’d been there. Fuck. Brian had told him to leave. _He’s my stalker,_ he’d told what’s-his-name. God, there’d been tears and declarations of “I . . . I really thought we . . .” What the hell had he been thinking picking up a schoolboy? But that was it, wasn’t it? He hadn’t been thinking. He never did. He didn’t need Lindsey or Deb to tell him that. 

His morning jerk-off in the shower was lackluster to say the least, which put him in an even fouler mood than he was in already. Plus he was out of coffee, and the nearest Starbucks was three one-way streets from his office building.

_He’s my stalker._

Fuck, what an asshole. That’s what you said when someone really _was_ a stalker. Brian knew because he’d had several. There’d even been one that’d required a restraining order. The kid wasn’t stalking him, he was just . . . just being a kid.

The first one hadn’t been too bad – an older guy who was quickly disposed of when Brian called his house and informed his wife about her husband’s hobbies (“No, ma’am, it isn’t scuba diving or model trains.”) The next was a guy from the gym who kept leaving notes in Brian’s locker. Fortunately, he’d had a short attention span. But the third guy. Mr. Restraining Order. That’d been another situation all together. The dude wasn’t only persistent, he was fucking creepy. He’d keyed the Jeep, left roses under the windshield wipers and rambling psychotic messages about carving his name on Brian's chest with a corkscrew on the answering machine despite Brian’s certainty he’d never given the guy his phone number . . . . ah, yes. The fucking phonebook. Let your fingers do the walking. What a dumb slogan. “A stalker’s best friend,” was more like it.

It should’ve made him feel better, but the knowledge that he’d probably never see the kid again didn’t make him feel anything except worse. When he got off the elevator, he immediately told Cynthia to reschedule his meeting with The Boys. He was even less in the mood for incompetence than usual.

Sometimes his dick seemed like that friend in high school who always got you in trouble when you hung out with him. Had he really thought a boy with a newly popped cherry was just going to disappear? Especially a boy with the balls to go home with a complete stranger in the first place? Plus there’d been that damn trip to the hospital. The kid had seen him in one of the most vulnerable states he’d ever been in. Holding Gus that first time . . . he hadn’t known whether he wanted to cry or throw up. Justin had witnessed that moment – that moment when Brian had been stripped of every artifice. Amazed, scared . . . humbled. Jesus, he should’ve told the kid to stay in the Jeep. But he hadn’t. Instead the kid had picked his son’s name, and then Brian had fucked him into the mattress with one of the most durable hard-ons he’d ever had. Must’ve hurt like fuck, but from the kid’s expression, you wouldn’t have been able to tell. He’d looked like he’d died and gone to heaven.

And then he’d shown up at Woody’s, the ballsy little bastard. And then, even after a patented Brian's-A-Selfish-Prick Lecture from Mikey, he’d gone to Brian’s place and knocked on the door at one o’clock in the morning wanting “to talk.” Christ.

“It’ll catch up to you someday,” Deb liked to say. “What’s that called again? Sounds like “caramel’?”

“Karma,” Brian would say for the thousandth time. “Good thing I don’t believe in it.”

“Just because you don’t believe in something doesn’t mean it’s not real.”

The knock made him jump. “What is it?” he asked tersely when Cynthia opened the door.

“Someone here to see you. Cute kid.”

 _What?_ Brian’s heart skipped at least three beats and then started hammering against his ribs while something that felt like a mixture of alarm, chagrin . . . and hope flooded his veins.

“I’m busy,” he barked and quickly tried to make the lie look like truth.

“Okay,” Cynthia said warily, “but remember you got all queeny when Ryder didn’t include your name on the list of people the prospective interns needed to meet.”

Interns. Oh yeah, right. He’d forgotten today was the day the agency would be doing interviews. He sighed with relief.

Cynthia frowned at him and then asked – because she was a nosy bitch – who Brian had thought she’d meant.

“No one,” Brian snapped. As always he couldn’t meet her eyes because if he did, he’d start laughing. Cynthia was one of the few heterosexuals who understood him – at least to the extent anyone did.

“Uh-huh,” she said and turned to leave. As usual, she didn’t believe him. It was oddly refreshing. Lindsay assumed that if he’d ever gone straight, he would’ve ended up with her, but she was wrong. Actually it would’ve been Cynthia who’d be making his lunches and bouncing their baker's dozen of babies on her knee.

He grimaced. God, he’d dodged a big fucking bullet by being gay.

For the brief moment before the arrival of the “cute kid,” Brian tipped back in his chair and closed his eyes with a weary sigh. He’d deny it to anyone who asked, but he never lied to himself if he could help it: There’d been a fleeting jolt of excitement and anticipation when he’d thought it might be Justin . . . and maybe even a hint of relief knowing that Justin hadn’t given up. Which was crazy, of course. In every way, Brian needed a lovesick adolescent like he needed a hole in his head. Plus Mikey was jealous. Brian could tell. He was so pissed when Justin had accompanied them to the hospital. It was supposed to have been a Brian & Mikey adventure, not a Brian & Mikey & Brian’s Barely Legal Trick adventure. Brian sighed again. Damn it. Just another reason why he should’ve made the kid wait in the Jeep or even better back at the Loft. But for some reason, it hadn’t even occurred to him to do either.

Turned out the “cute kid” was a twenty year-old voluptuous red-head who’d no doubt made Ryder’s dick stand up and take notice. She and Brian had a pleasant but brief conversation, after all she’d probably been hired already. Brian’s opinion on the matter was utterly irrelevant at this point. Good thing he liked her . . . and then liked her even more when he noticed the rainbow heart pin on her bag. Alas, poor Ryder.

After she left, he hit speaker phone and dialed Ryder’s extension.

“Let me guess,” he said, leaning back in his chair and putting his feet on the desk. “She’s hired.”

He heard what sounded like a cross between an indigent and an amused snort. “She was the best candidate I’ve interviewed.”

“She was the _only_ candidate you’ve interviewed,” Brian corrected him.

“Well, what was the point of more interviews? Can’t do better than a four-point-O . . .”

“Big tits _and_ Magna Cum Laude. Hope she knows something about advertising.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Ryder replied. “I can teach her on the job.”

Brian laughed. “Later,” he said and hung-up. God, sometimes Ryder was a dirty old dog. It almost made Brian respect him. Almost. Then again, he had to admit – if it’d been Justin who’d walked through the door looking for an internship, it would’ve been Brian’s dick that stood at full attention.

Fuck.

Brian got up, locked his door and pulled the blinds. The way the kid’s body had resisted and then welcomed him – God, he hadn’t had such a tight ass in forever. Maybe even _literally_ forever. He reached in his drawer, pulled out the Astroglide, and came with a name on his lips. In all of his life, Brian had never said a name when he climaxed. It was disconcerting to say the very least.

* * * *

“You are unbelievable, you know that.”

It wasn’t a question. Justin turned away from Daphne’s closet and stood with his arms outspread. “You’re just realizing that now?” he said. “Hey, whatdya think?”

She gave him an exaggeratedly skeptical once-over. “You look great,” she said with a grin. He pretended to look crestfallen.

“Great? That’s it? I was going for ‘hot,’ not 'great'.”

She threw her ratty, vaguely racist Cabbage Patch doll at him. “Modest much? Yeah, you look hot. Definitely hotter than you do in Nike t-shirts and plaid.”

He threw the doll back at her in poorly feigned irritation. “Hey, by the way,” he said. “Thanks for letting me keep my new clothes here. My mom’s a big snoop.”

“Especially that shirt you can see your nipples through. Not exactly a St. James sweatshirt.”

He walked over to the full-length mirror and regarded himself from every angle. “I don’t wear sweatshirts,” he said. “I’m not a kid anymore.”

She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right. You’re the biggest kid ever. You practically live at the arcade and Nike Town, and you think it’s still cool to watch MTV.”

“Not anymore,” he said, flopping down on the bed beside her. “I’m a man now.”

“Because you had sex? Shit, Justin, lots of kids at school have had sex, and they’re still immature brats.”

“It’s not _just_ the sex,” he replied. “It's who I had sex _with_. Brian Kinney. The hottest guy who ever lived.”

She smothered him with her pillow and then leaped off the bed and out of reach before he could wrestle her into submission and tickle her. “I guess I’ll just have to judge for myself,” she said teasingly. “Now, come one. Let’s go before my parents get home.”

 

He felt queasy the second he stepped through the doors of Babylon. It was like being on a ride at the fair – one of those rides that makes you puke up your fried dough. Bright lights and blaring sternum-thumping music. Wild whirling movement. He turned to Daphne.

“You wanna go?” he asked. He was way out of his league. The place smelled like a combination of the guys’ locker room at school and his sheets after he’d come on them so many times they got crusty. He looked around, feeling like a small forest creature sticking its head out of its burrow and watching fearfully for the shadow of a hawk. Gorgeous guys everywhere, sweating grinding clutching kissing. This is where Brian spent his nights? God, why’d he ever picked up Justin in the first place? Justin’s body couldn’t compete with any other man’s in the place. Reflexively, he slid a hand under his shirt and felt the softness of the baby-fat a late puberty hadn’t yet managed to diminish. And his chest . . . shit. Most of the guys around him had tits bigger than the sluttiest girls at school – except theirs were rock hard and tan and shining with sweat.

 _Please,_ he wanted to beg Daphne. _Let’s get out of here and go to Friendly’s for French fries and shakes. You were right – I _am_ still a kid. I’m not ready to be a man_.

“What for? We just got here,” she said. 

He took a deep breath and accepted the fate he'd preordained for himself. “Okay, come on,” he said, pulling her in the direction of a metal staircase that looked like the scaffolding on his school’s library building that was in the middle of being renovated. “Up the stairs over there.” It was weird. The manliest of man stuff was surrounded by guys wearing eyeliner and glitter and dancing with the exaggerated movements of what Justin had been called a few times – a sissy. He’d burned with shame when the term was directed at him by lacrosse players in the locker room, but here he suspected it might actually be a compliment.

They climbed halfway up the stairs. Justin had only ever been stared at with curiosity or contempt, but now he could feel the animal desire in the gazes of the men around him who parted admiringly before his and Daphne’s assent.

“They’re all looking at you,” she whispered.

“No, they’re not,” he said. “It’s probably you.” He was used to people looking at Daphne appreciatively, but never at him. If he wasn’t being tormented and teased at school, he was being ignored.

“Shut up,” she said, punching his arm. “This is a _gay_ club. I probably gross them out. It’s you, Justin, not me. They’re looking at _you_.”

He smiled at her gratefully. That was one of the reasons they’d been best friends since they first met. She made him feel like he wasn’t embarrassing to be around. She could’ve been best friends with the popular girls, but instead she was best friends with him. 

He put his arms around her and gave her a squeeze so tight that she elbowed him in the chest.

“Don’t do that,” she said. “They’ll think you’re straight.”

He cracked up at that and felt some of the tension drain from his body. “Well, if they did, they’d be the first. Look, there he is! There’s Brian!” 

“Where?” she said, shading her eyes with her hand. “I can’t see him.”

“The guy with the dark hair and black shirt.”

She laughed. “Okay, ‘dark hair’ not helpful, black shirt helpful. That must be him,” she said pointing. “He’s like the only guy with clothes on.”

“Stop pointing,” Justin hissed even though he’d been doing the same thing just a moment earlier.

“That’s Brian?” she said. “He’s so skinny!”

“He is not!” Justin said indignantly. “He’s the hottest guy in the whole place.”

“Except maybe for that guy he’s dancing with. Look, he’s got someone.”

In his excitement to see Brian, Justin had failed to notice he was dancing with a tall man in a silver shirt who was at least as handsome as Brian was – maybe even more so. Not that you’d be able to tell, though. Even from a distance, Justin could tell it was Brian who was in charge. Silver-Shirt-Man’s movements had slipped inside the lure of Brian’s aura, and it was Brian who controlled the speed, the distance, the intimacy. And then, as Justin watched, Brian summoned a second man, equally as gorgeous as Silver-Shirt-Man and whispered in his ear.

Justin’s stomach turned over, and this time he was _sure_ he was going to be sick. You’d have to be blind not to see that Brian was the center of it all. The conductor of the music, the origin of the electricity crackling through the air. The magician with the box and the saw and the beautiful volunteer willing to accept his dare. He didn’t need a bare chest and a bramble of thorns tattooed around his bicep. His edicts were effortlessly delivered in nothing but a smoldering glance, a glimpse of perfection, a night of sex that eclipses all others, past or future, or even imagined.

“Is he going to do it with _both_ of them?” Daphne gasped, clutching Justin’s arm.

“He can do anything he wants,” Justin replied, his voice full of pride and despair in equal measure. 

It was now or never – and never was unthinkable. How does one measure a missed opportunity? We’re defined by what we have, not what we lack. If Brian broke his heart again, he’d still be in the same place he already was. There was nothing to lose. He caught Daphne’s hand and squeezed it. 

“Wish me luck,” he said and kissed her cheek.

* * * *

It was a sensation he’d never felt before. Not really. At least not like _this_. Yeah, he got jealous when it came to Mikey. Mikey was _his_ , Goddamn it, and always would be. He even (although he’d deny it to his grave) got jealous when other guys hit on Emmett and Ted (they were his too, Goddamn it). But this was new. This made him fucking _crazy_.

There he was. The kid. Sandwiched between the two hottest guys in the house. They were touching him, caressing him. His sides, his chest, his waist, his hips. Brian could feel the raw need radiating off his would-be-tricks as though Justin was a bitch in heat. This wasn’t a “blow me in the backroom” dance. This was a bona fide “come home with us and we’ll more than make it worth your time.”

Justin’s skin was paler than any other guy’s in the place. His body was soft, the young muscle only hinted at. And who was really that fair-haired? Fuck. The kid was no bottle blond. Brian knew for a fact that the carpet matched the drapes. The boy was a fucking Viking. A regular Leif Ericson . . .

. . . and he was untouched, untainted, a blank sheet of paper, a newly kilned clay tablet. The men surrounding him? They were already ruined. But not the kid. Not Justin.

It was as easy as he’d hoped: The guys stepped back when Brian pushed them away and made his claim. Silver-Shirt-Man even nodded to him in a gesture of admiring acquiescence. The kid was _his_.

Justin was too innocent to play coy, and that, as much as anything, did Brian in. He threw himself into Brian’s arms as if he belonged in Brian’s embrace. Before, with the other two, Brian had been slick with heat and the longed for release of orgasm, but Justin made him want to _earn_ it.

“Do you know what you’re doing?” he whispered against Justin’s ear, and the kid surprised him by answering honestly.

“No. But I don't care.”

Brian laughed and picked him up. His boy. As fearless as he was vulnerable.

Somewhere deep, back in the dusty corners of the memories he’d mummified and locked away, back where the sunlight seldom reached, he remembered. Never. Not since Mr. Culpepper, had he ever had sex with a man twice. He claimed Justin’s mouth and marveled that this would be the first time. Justin was coming home with him. This wasn’t a game. Games were for fun, things you did and then finished – put Monopoly back in the box, pull the plugs out of Battleship, put away the Yahtzee dice. This wasn’t a game. And it was no longer just for fun.

“Tell your little friend to go home,” he said. “You’re coming with me.”

* * * *

Was this the moment?

The moment his best friend turned away forever?

Michael watched Brian and that kid dancing, their arms around each other in a way that was too casual to mean a feral seduction ending in the backroom, yet too intimate to mean anything less than waking up to the same 6:30 a.m. alarm.

He knew beyond a doubt that Brian would lie to him tomorrow. Or if not outright lie, then omit the crucial details.

What was it about that kid? He wasn’t as hot as the other guys Brian fucked. He was embarrassingly infatuated. He should be beneath Brian’s contempt, but yet . . .

Michael shut his eyes. The trail mix had worn off, and he was tired. Ted had already left, and Emmett was being hit on by some guy with a ring in his nose who looked suspiciously like an undertaker. There was no point in staying. Not that there ever really was.

He could try and try and try to protect him, but Brian would still get fatally hurt one of these days. It was nothing but time that intervened. The only question was whether Michael would need a defibrillator or a mop. The kid was going to hurt him, maybe not right away, but eventually. 

Michael pulled the keys for the Jeep from his pocket, held them up and jingled them. Brian shook his head and pointed at the kid. Then he made a shooing gesture. Good. Brian always knew when he shouldn’t be driving. Michael stood watching for another couple of minutes. Brian reached down and cupped the kid’s crotch just as Michael had done to Brian earlier in the bathroom stall.

_What are you doing?_

If only he had the balls, he would’ve said, “What do you think, asshole?” But of course, he hadn’t. The whole fucking world could touch Brian like that – including some silly little twink from the suburbs – but not him, not the one person who really knew him, who really cared about him. It wasn’t fair. He looked down at Brian again, and again the bastard made that dismissive shooing gesture. Michael turned away. He couldn’t be angry; Brian had told him to leave at least partially for Michael’s own good. Brian never drove when he was high, and he never made Michael watch. Thank God for small blessings.

_You don’t know what we did._

It’d irked Michael beyond measure that the kid was right. Michael really didn’t know. He never would. He found the Jeep, opened the door and slid into the driver’s seat. The side street, smelling like pizza from Tony’s Takeout, was illuminated by the neon signs of a nail parlor. It’d rained earlier. When Michael turned on the wipers, the light seemed to smear the windshield with red and blue paint. Something about the illusion made him unbearably sad, and he rested his head on the steering wheel. Tears prickled the corners of his eyes. He blinked them away. He wasn’t going to do it; he wasn’t going to cry over Brian yet again. He thought it over and over until the words became a mantra. _Not gonna not gonna not gonna . . . not gonna cry_ echoed in his head but all the same, the unstoppable tears ran down his face. _I’m not gonna to cry over you, Brian Kinney_ , he thought. _But maybe – just maybe – someday you’ll cry over me_.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm new to QaF and just started a new journal for my new obsession. Come visit me at [Queerasfray](http://queerasfray.livejournal.com/).


End file.
